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Showing posts from December, 2017

Star F**king Across The Universe

It’s over 50 years since Star Trek first hit American TV screens and it reached the BBC in July 1969, just a week before Neil Armstrong took humanity’s first steps in its own wagon train to the stars. In those 50 years-ish, the whole franchise has been at the forefront of making history and pushing all sorts of boundaries. From the famous first interracial kiss to being an inspiration to real-life astronauts, Star Trek can likely lay claim to being the most aspirational umbrella of speculative fiction in history. There have been some truly outstanding attempts to show the whole of humanity’s potential, whether directly such as the inclusion of the Russian Chekov during the real life Cold War, or through analogy like Sisko’s Prophet-induced vision in Far Beyond the Stars . It’s also been a genuine inspiration to real life events – the very first Space Shuttle is called Enterprise , although it never left Earth’s atmosphere, and this idea came full circle when Enterprise’s ficti...

And I'm still not ginger!

Hello there... If you've found your way here, I'm guessing you're a regular and/or former reader of my column which has been published - and well-supported - by GeekPlanetOnline for the last nine years... Queer Eye For The Sci Fi . If you are...great! If not... welcome! The original concept was a regular (ahem) column in which I discussed elements of LGBT representation in science fiction and fantasy (aka "genre") media. From Doctor Who 's "gay agenda" to, erm, discussion about gay characters in Doctor Who , via zebras and Klingons and bears (oh, myyyyyy...) I hope my columns have at least entertained, if not informed and maybe even provoked some thought and discussion. For me, I'm happy if they're read and it is for that that I will be forever grateful to everyone over at GeekPlanetOnline for giving me what some might call my first break*. Sadly, but for the very best reasons, GeekPlanetOnline is closing its doors soon. However, I...